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Monday, April 20, 2015

Helping Pastors Tied to the Whipping Post

Kopp Disclosure

(John 3:19-21)

@#$%

@#$%

Some pastors,
elders, deacons, church members, denominations, and other ecclesiastical
ghetto-dwellers seem determined to do their worst to repel people from Jesus by
the lack of Jesus in their lives that convinces people who really need Jesus - Everybody! - that they
don't want Jesus to do for them what the ghetto-dwellers boast He's done
for them.

"If that's what
Jesus does for yu'uns," they say, "we don't want any part of Him
because we don't want any part of you because we don't want to be like
you."

Really.

Why would anyone
who really needs Jesus want to hang out with people who say they know
Jesus while acting so horrifically avec each other?

Ecclesiastical
ghetto-dwellers are notorious for gossip, lies, back-stabbing, fights,
divisions, denominational pride/arrogance, shooting their wounded,
unforgiveness, angers, hatreds, spending so much money on antependia and vestimentum and other
useless ornaments in spitting distance of the poor in direct
contradiction to Matthew 23 and 25, and other selfishly motivated polemics sooooooo antithetical to
Jesus by the book.

Really.

People who are
close to Jesus have character traits, more than less, akin to Galatians 5:22,
Philippians 2:3-4, and...

It not, not.

I think of the
little boy who asked his mommy what they were having for dinner after church.

She said,
"The pastor."

@#$%

Speaking of
pastors, I'm especially concerned about the young ones who are being eaten
alive by churches whose connection to Jesus is only coincidental.

Annnnnnnd I'm concerned
about geezer pastors like me and denominational whatevers that don't seem to
give a ___ about how they're being eaten alive.

Annnnnnnd how do we know
geezer pastors like me and denominational whatevers don't really give a ___
about how the rookies are being eaten alive by churches whose connection to
Jesus is only coincidental?

Easy.

They're not doing
a heaven thing to stop it!

Annnnnnnd as those geezer
pastors like me and denominational whatevers boast about their invitational,
inclusive, welcoming, and agapeish
whatevers, it might not be a bad idea, by why of convincing example, to do
something for heaven's sake about it to maybe, again, by way of example, show
those who really need Jesus - Everybody!
- that He can really, really, really, existentially as well as
eternally, make a positive, peaceful, unifying, and redemptive difference.

@#$%

A recent exchange
with a peer comes to mind.

@#$%

He began, "I
have to laugh sometimes when I read your stuff; especially when you write about
people who hate you in a
Christian kinda way...I resonate with that. Yet, after ___
years, many of them have given up and gone elsewhere; although there are
still one or two hanging around to zing darts at me...My first ___ years were a
living hell...Every now and then, I see someone who's left the church in the
___ years since I arrived. They say things to intentionally hurt me,
like, 'I'll come back after you have moved on.' I'm tempted to say, 'I'm
still here and I'm going to stay to make sure you don't come back!'"

Continuing,
"That's not why I'm writing...When you got up at the end of the meeting, I
thought, 'Oh no, Bob, please sit down so we can all go home.' Then I
listened to what you had to say about how we aren't really doing anything to
help our young pastors in trouble and was glad you spoke."

He asked,
"What can we do about it?...Some church members are just plain mean.
They are, as you put it, posers and pretenders..."

Getting to the
issue, "Our young pastors are so starry-eyed and idealistic...How do we
toughen them up without making them cynical? What can we do for
them?...Over the years, I have had to face some very nasty people who wanted
their own way no matter what...A couple of those fights almost killed me.
What can we really do to help?"

He concluded,
"Maybe some are not really called into pastoral ministry. We know
that by the numbers who are quitting. But maybe some wouldn't quit if we
helped them. Lord knows it isn't going to stop anytime soon. I fear
it will only get worse. What do you suggest?"

@#$%

I responded.

"While I'm
just scratching the surface of my relationship with Jesus by the book after too
many years of going with the ecclesiastical flow in contrast to the red letters
with particular note of Matthew 15 and 23, part of my rebirthing has included
an authentically increasing grief generating passion to care for the victims of
so many irregulars, irascibles, irreconcilables, and other miscreants in local
churches who go unchecked as they bruise, beat, batter, and butcher other
members and their undershepherds
while those who could do something mutter, 'Well, preachers come and go but...'

Certainly, I am
not an expert on this; but I have reached some conclusions:

1. We will spend
a lot longer time with Jesus than anybody else; so we may as well try to honor
Him more than others;

2. We're 'damned
if we do and damned if we don't' and, knowing that, we are liberated to pray
and labor to sow, salt, shine, and, depending upon His graces to overcome our
sins, be the 'good' leaven mixing in to make better. If we're going to
catch everything but heaven regardless, we may as well give 'em the Gospel according
to Jesus by the book while remaining eager to be corrected by Jesus, the Bible,
and common sense;

3. We've gotta
take Matthew 25 seriously; and be willing to look up, stand up, speak up, and
act up for Him for others as for Him even if we catch hell for it;

4. We've gotta
love enough not to be liked; telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth while remaining eager to be corrected by Jesus, the Bible, and
common sense;

5. Bravehearts
not fainthearts ministering in an Actsual
kinda way is our call or, as you suggest, we are not called. We are not,
to borrow a line from Dylan, 'errand boys for the wandering desires' of people,
churches, denominations, government, and so on. We are not called to
agree with the last person that we've talked to like bad sentences ending in
prepositions. We are supposed to be His always with everybody;

6. While we'd
like to win and bring all of the miscreants to discipline and care for the
wounded, it must be enough for us to tell the truth as we see it while
remaining eager to be corrected by...;

7. We must
sacrifice. It is nauseating, especially at clergy meetings, to hear how
we're caring for the people over
there or the marginalized over
here and there and how our witness to the oppressed and blah, blah,
blah...while we wink at the young pastors and church members who are suffering right here! Maybe
it's time for judicatories to act like bishops! Maybe some churches
should not be allowed to pick pastors of their choosing! Maybe it's time
to pass the hat for churches who can't pay their pastors! If we can pass
the hat for people over
there, why can't we pass the hat for people right here? I really
think it's time for people like you and me to ___ on the parade every now and
then and get up and say the emperor has not clothes and everything's not great
and let's pick up the rug and see what's been swept under it and...

That's not a
comprehensive assessment.

It's a start.

Finally, I think
it's important to admit when we have made mistakes and ask forgiveness; and if
other folks can't/won't forgive us, they need to turn in their clergy/Christian
cards and admit they aren't in/with/through/for Him. Jesus said a lot
about that. Churches and pastors and anyone else who likes to give up on
each other and quit and hold grudges just might wanna consider the eternal
consequences of their existential dissing, distancing, and divorcing. As
Martha Young told me so long ago, 'You love 'em and let God judge 'em; but love
'em enough to tell 'em that God's comin' back to judge 'em!'

Maybe you and I
can start raising a little heaven at presbytery meetings.

Maybe the
moderator of our presbytery meetings better hold her/his breath when they ask
for new or unfinished
business."

2 comments:

Laura
said...

Thank you for bringing this to our attention, Bob. I'll be praying for your ministry in this area and will look forward to learning more ways about how I may be an encouragement to ALL pastors, be they young or geezer. :)

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. --Romans 15:13

I guess I don`t hang out with the people that talk bad about you or the Church. I think our Church has some of the nicest people that worship there. I been going there since 1988. Pastor Kopp you are the Best truthful Pastor this Church has ever had. You speak from the Heart. People may say I`m wrong but this is how I feel. God Bless you and the Family of Faith 221 North Main Belvidere Il